Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1887-03-09
The New and the Old.

| ern progress and development III must
be pleasant to every southern man to
see the South receiving in this respect
from these sources the recognition
which is her due. No country in the
world ever recuperated more rapidly
| from the effects of devastating war
| than has the South. All things
considered, her people have proved
models of patience, industry, and
cheerfulncSs. They deserve the
highest encomiums that can be
passed upon them for the manner in
which they have put their shoulders to
the wheel. Nothing has been said as to
the material progress of the South so
far, nor as to her industrial possibilities,
that is not true. There is anew South,
q great new South, of which we have
reasons to be proud ; but there is also
an old South, and this latter fact should
not be forgotten. We should not, in
Justice to the past, allow ourselves to be
carried away by the current that would
sweep the old South from its proper
place, and its important position
as an element in the evolution
of both the new South and the
nation. We must guard against the new
South idea run mad and the disposition,
shown even among our own people,
to yaunt the new at the expense Of the
old. That this disposition exists and
goes to the extent sometimes of ig-
noring almost all that was good and
great in the past must be evident to
every one who has kept up with the
discussion of "sOuthern progress.
To give examples Mr.. CHARLES DUB
LEY WARNER, who has recently re-
visited the South, writes in Harper
that he finds "the men of the South
who are taking the lead in public af-
fairs ready to address themselves to
economical problems and national is
sues and the impulse to this tendency
has come, and is still more coming,
through the interest taken in
the common schools and the de-
yelopment of the industrial re-
sources of the country" Again, in
an article in the Century Professor
TILLKTT, a southern man, says 1.-The
new South, therefore-the industrial,
intellectual, and religious new South,
of which we here speak-began pro-
perly at the close of the first decade
after the war" Both these articles
merit commentator, and were written
with the evident purpose of doing good.
But the extracts We have made are Of
a piece with columns of matter we have
seen in northern papers, and which
have received the quasi endorsement of
rot few southern journals. Such
statements are not only unjust to the
South, hut are not borne ont by the
facts. When have the leading men Of
the South failed to address themselves to
economical problems and national is
sues? At no time since the foundation
of the Government. To the fact that
such sphere has been in large
measure the bent of southern in
telloct and southern ambition is due
much OF the greatness the nation
had attained prior to the war. TO
nothing does the nation owe more
than it does TO southern Craftsmanship.
We grant that the South has taken q
new departure in the matter Of light
literature since the war. Her writer's
ale appealing to larger audience, but
none the less we had before the
var our poets, orr scientific men,
ocr great thcologians, orr orators,
end not "some," rs Professor To-
LIT observes, but many statesmen.
Those Of US who we're literally edu-
Gated" were thoroughly educated
were educated under a system that
taught men to think. The demand of
the masses was for that instruction
which is gotten from public discussion,
and it was met. Had there been a de-
mand for that class of southern writers
whopost-date the war, and who we recog-
nized, constitute an ornament to the
South and are doing splendid work, it
would have been metalso The intellect
wasin the old South, and simply accom-
modated itself to the old RHYME. To
admit the contrary is to fly into the face
of history. To take up with the idea
that southern progress in any direction
is anything but accommodating old
powers and forces to the requirements
Of the new order is to do violence to
right and truth. Those who talk of the
intellectual South as something new
forget that the very principles upon
which this Government rests were put
into practice by southern intellect.
That impulses are at work which make
southern intellect felt in channels more
varied than ever before we do not deny.
Moreover, We are glad that this is so.
But We do deny that southern intel.
lect has Just now emerged from
cloud which should be put away
from u.s. We do deprecate as sub
versive of the best interests OF the
South statements and arguments which
would make il appear that the South
owes her recent progress to intellectual,
moral, social, and religious awakening,
revolution, and reform.
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Coon NEws.-The Petersburg Iadsr-
1DDeaf brings the following GOOD